HE – 21, a junior theater major; naïve, dramatic, kind
SHE – 22, a senior botany major; smart, cynical, kind
TIME
Now.
Maybe then, too.
Maybe later as well.
PLACE
An empty blackbox theatre.
A college campus.
Somewhere in the heart of America.
Sometime during the middle of a pandemic.
NOTES
After SHE comes on stage and the pair begin interacting, HE should remove a bottle of hand sanitizer from his backpack and use it whenever they move too closely to each other or in those rare instances when SHE touches him. These actions have not been written specifically into the script and rather should grow organically out of the rehearsal process and the chemistry between the actors playing SHE and HE.
Also, the ghost light should remain lit for the entire play, including during the blackout that ends the show.
The quotation about distance and displacement comes from Jaclyn Moriarty’s The Cracks in the Kingdom.
Editor's Note: This is the original script, as shared by the author.
An empty blackbox theatre on a college campus somewhere in the heart of America.
A ghost light (lit) stands in the center of the playing space.
Beat.
Beat.
Beat.
HE enters through one of the main “EXIT” doors of the theatre. HE looks around the space, tentatively at first, as if he expects someone to jump out from behind a set piece or from around a corner. Except the space is empty. And the corners hide nothing. So his anxiety is absurd. Or is it?
A beat. Then, he notices the ghost light. It is like a beacon calling him home.
HE (obvious relief)
Oh! A light in the dark.
HE stares at the ghost light for a couple beats, almost reverentially. Then HE removes his backpack and sets it to the side of the playing space before crossing to the center of the space. For a few beats, HE stands completely still, eyes closed, just taking in the space. HE likely takes several deep, calming breaths.
Then HE opens his eyes and begins to turn in ever-widening circles, a kid basking in the joy of being home. This space gives him life. It gives him energy. It is his sole reason for existing.
Then HE begins to sing “No One Is Alone” from Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods. His voice is tentative, halting at first. But as the song progresses, his voice takes on a confidence that is riveting.
HE (sings)
Mother isn’t here now.
Who knows what she’d say?
Nothing’s quite so clear now.
Feel you’ve lost your way?
You decide but
You are not alone.
Believe me.
No one is alone.
Truly.
Beat.
HE (cont)
I wish…
Suddenly a voice emerges from the darkness. Perhaps from the catwalk—if there is a catwalk. Or the tech booth. Or perhaps from everywhere and nowhere at once. Each time SHE speaks, though, the voice should seem to originate from a different location within the theater.
SHE
I see you.
HE
What--? Where--? Wait! Who’s there?
SHE
Would you believe God?
HE
Honey, even Joan Osborne knew that God wasn’t one of us. Hence the question, “What if…”
SHE
If not God, Godot?
HE
Then I’d still be waiting, wouldn’t I? Where are you? Who are you?
SHE
I am everywhere and nowhere. I am The Great and Powerful Oz.
HE
Does that mean I can ignore the person behind the curtain? Wait, are you actually behind a curtain?
HE searches for a curtain behind which SHE might be hiding. To no avail.
SHE
Why are you here?
HE
Me?!? I’m a theater major. This is my mothership, my port in a storm.
SHE
“Port in a storm?” Okay, Grandma.
HE
Why are you here?
SHE
I live here.
HE
You don’t live here. This is a theater. No one lives… (An epiphany?) Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh, wait. Are. You. F-F-Frances?
SHE
Frances? No. I mean, yes, it is me. Or I? Frances.
HE
I knew you were real!
SHE
Well, why. Wouldn’t I. Be real?
HE (continuous)
When we were doing Albee’s The American Dream—I played Daddy (No recognition) The male lead? Anyway, Jennie Shoemaker swore up and down that you were an urban legend.
SHE (Dismissively)
Jennie Shoemaker. What does that no-talent twit know?
HE (again, continuous)
But not me. I knew from the first time I heard your story that you weren’t an urban legend or some tall tale. I knew that you were the spirit that protects this theater and its creative artists.
SHE
Spirit?
Beat.
SHE
Holy sh#t, you mean you think I’m a ghost?
SHE laughs. Rather more loudly and enthusiastically than the occasion might call for.
Beat.
HE (blandly)
So, you’re not Frances, then?
SHE emerges from the catwalk. Or enters from one of the theatre doors. Or simply appears.
SHE
Sorry to burst your bubble, but I am a flesh-and-blood woman.
HE
That wasn’t nice.
SHE
What wasn’t…?
HE
I know you’re not a theater person, but when you’re in our space, you should show a little respect for our customs.
SHE
And it is your custom to believe in poltergeists and hauntings? What is this? Eastern Europe, circa 1897?
HE
It is our custom to respect those who have gone before us and who, for whatever reason, cannot or will not leave a theater, which we regard as a safe space.
Beat.
SHE
You’re serious.
HE
Did you know that the Palace, which by the way is reputed to have more ghosts than any other Broadway theatre, has a child ghost who plays peekaboo in the mezzanine, a musician dressed in white who appears in the orchestra pit, AND a tight-rope walker whose appearance is supposed to foretell a viewer’s death.
SHE (blandly)
Frightening.
HE
At the Eugene O’Neill, there is sometimes a strong scent of lilacs downstage left.
SHE
Especially when there is a big vase of lilacs downstage left.
HE
And The New Amsterdam. Well, it’s haunt…uh, inhabited by the spirit of a chorus girl named Olive Thomas.
SHE
You don’t say.
HE
Olive danced in the Ziegfeld Follies on the New Amsterdam mainstage in the teens. That’s the nineteen teens, not the twenty teens.
SHE
I figured.
HE
Anyway, she eventually got mixed up with Mary Pickford’s brother, Jack. You do know Mary Pickford, right? (SHE shakes her head.) Mary? Pickford? (No response from SHE.) “The Girl With The Curls” Mary Pickford? (Still no response.) Best Actress for Coquette, 1929, Mary Pickford? (Nope.) Actress in 52 feature films? The woman who introduced Dorothy and Lillian Gish to D. W. Griffith—Mary Pickford? Namesake of the Mary Pickford Theatre?
SHE
Never heard of her.
HE
Alright. Well. Olive Thomas got mixed up with Jack Pickford, brother of “America’s Sweetheart” Mary Pickford, but God forbid anyone know their theater history. So on a trip to Paris in 1920, Jack announced that he had contracted syphilis and that Olive most likely was infected as well. Now, if you’ve ever read Ibsen’s Ghosts, which I acknowledge is a long shot, you understand what a predicament Miss Olive found herself in in 1920, which was thirty-nine years after Ghosts was written and eight years before Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin. Without a cure in sight, poor Miss Olive “accidentally” swallowed an overdose—that is, a whole bottle—of Jack’s mercury bichloride. She died two days later. But then she began appearing to actors, to crew backstage at the New Amsterdam. And has ever since.
Beat.
SHE
Sounds like an urban legend to me.
Beat.
Beat.
HE
Who are you? And Why. Are. You. Here?
SHE (referencing the ghost light)
What is this thing anyway?
Beat.
Beat.
Beat.
HE
If you must know, it’s a ghost light.
SHE begins to say something. HE cuts her off.
HE
And if you say one word…
SHE
My lips are sealed. What is a ghost light? She asked. With genuine curiosity. Never once judging him for the obvious rudimentary intellect that allowed him to believe in poltergeists and hauntings in the first place.
Beat.
HE
A ghost light. He said. To the philistine before him. A ghost light is a theatrical tradition. As much a part of (gestures around the space as if signifying the immensity of the universe) all of this as saying “Break a leg” to wish someone luck or referring to Shakespeare’s tragedy as “That Scottish Play.”
Beat.
HE
It’s a light. A single. Bulbed. Light. We leave it illuminated to ensure that anybody who is here is safe.
SHE (with levity)
From ghosts.
HE (seriously)
Is safe. From. Anything. Any obstacles. That might be. In their way.
Beat.
SHE
Why didn’t you leave? When the Governor and the Dean ordered us to?
HE
Why didn’t you?
Beat.
SHE
My name is Corrine.
HE
Charlie. I’m a theater major.
SHE (A chuckle, but without judgment)
No sh#t.
HE
And you are, he asked, in a genuine effort to know her?
SHE
I study botany.
HE
You are a long way from home. Isn’t there a greenhouse on the other side of campus you could be hanging out in until this pandemic blows over?
SHE (moves toward exit)
If I’m in your way here…
HE (a bit too quickly)
No. You’re welcome to stay. I mean, if you want to.
Beat.
SHE
You sure you don’t want me to go?
HE
It’s up to you. But. There’s. Plenty of room here. For both of us. In case you. Want. To stay.
SHE hesitates for several beats. Then, SHE casually returns to the playing space, sitting cross-legged some distance from HE.
HE
So, how long have you been here?
SHE
Almost four years. I’m graduating this May. Well, I’m supposed to be graduating this May. Who knows what will happen now?
HE
Actually, I meant how long have you been in this theater?
SHE
Oh. Right. That makes more sense. What is this, Monday?
HE
Thursday.
SHE
Thursday? Wow. Then that means I’ve been here for, uh, six days.
HE
Six days?!?
SHE
I wasn’t sure it was safe out there.
HE
It’s not so bad now that everyone has gone home.
SHE
Pretty easy to practice “social distancing” when there’s no one to be social with.
They laugh. Tentatively. Because they understand the enormity of what has just been said.
HE
In my YA lit class last year, we read this book—I can’t remember the title, something something Kingdom, maybe…I can’t even really recall much of the plot. But there was this one line that really spoke to me. And I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. “Distance is the journey. Displacement is the result.”
SHE
Stranger in a strange land.
Beat.
SHE
I also wasn’t sure whether I’d be able to get back in if I left. Speaking of which, how did you get in here? I assume all the exterior doors are locked.
HE
There’s a window in the costume shop with a broken latch.
SHE
That’s the kind of safety precautions I pay $40k a year for.
Another laugh. This one more hearty. Genuine.
SHE
So, where have you been hiding out since last Friday?
HE
My dorm room.
SHE
Shouldn’t your RA have kicked you out with the rest of the residents?
HE
I was hiding in a trunk at the foot of my bed.
SHE
How long were you in the trunk? For six days?
HE
Four hours. Maybe five, tops. Just until I was sure everyone had left the building.
SHE
You must really not want to go home.
HE
Something like that.
Beat.
Beat.
HE
Why didn’t you go home?
Beat.
SHE When I was home for the holidays, my parents—mostly my father, but my mother didn’t contradict him, she never does—they expressed concerns about some of my choices.
HE
Choices?
SHE (referring to a series of earrings in her left ear)
These. (pulling her hair away from the nape of her neck to reveal a tattoo of birds flying) This.
HE
They threw you out for some earrings and a tattoo?
SHE
They also were not fond of my decision to join an improv group. Or to take a feminist theory class. Or to vote Democrat. Or. Or. Or. They even object to my music choices.
HE (suspicious)
What do you listen to?
SHE
They’re afraid for my soul.
HE
And you?
SHE
I’m afraid that they’re assholes.
HE laughs, uncertain whether she’s serious. She is. Serious.
SHE
So, what’s responsible for your parental distancing? Is it the gay thing?
HE
The gay…thing? What makes you think…?
SHE
You come into an empty theater during a pandemic and the first thing you do is sing Sondheim. Doesn’t take Nancy Drew to figure out that mystery.
HE
I hate being a f#@king cliché.
Beat.
SHE
I was just kidding. It’s. What. I do. When I’m. Anxious.
HE
It’s not just the Sondheim thing. This whole “you can never go home again” trope. It’s so cliché. It’s so f#@king 1973, post-Stonewall-gay cliché.
SHE
Are your parents uber-religious?
HE
Trump-publicans. Which these days is basically the same thing.
Beat.
HE
School has always been my safe place. So, when we were told that we had to move out I had a moment of …
SHE (knowingly)
Panic.
HE (nods)
And dread. Where was I going to go?
SHE
What was I going to do? For money?
HE
For food?
SHE
And who knows how long this is going to last?
HE
When I was in that trunk. Waiting. I didn’t once think about getting sick. Not because I feel invincible or anything like that. I was just so worried about surviving from moment to moment that I couldn’t fathom this virus.
SHE
And that’s why you came here. To calm yourself.
HE (nods)
This is the closest thing to a place of worship that I’ve ever known.
SHE
And Sondheim?
HE
A Godhead.
Beat.
SHE touches his shoulder. And for the first time in the show he does not instinctively reach for his bottle of hand sanitizer.
Beat.
Beat.
SHE (an offering)
I just thought this would be a good place to hide out for a while. Lots of entrances and exits. Lots of places to hide in case campus security came a calling.
HE
Or a disciple of Sondheim.
SHE
Or a disciple of Sondheim.
Beat.
HE
How are you staying sane through all of this?
SHE
Who says I am?
Beat.
SHE
I listen to a lot of music.
HE
Which, we’ve established, your parents do not like.
Beat.
HE
What do you listen to?
SHE
My tastes are pretty eclectic.
HE
What was the last song you listened to?
SHE
I don’t know. (She does.)
HE
Play it for me.
SHE hesitates for a moment. Then, SHE removes a phone from her pocket and swipes the screen several times. Tinny punk music (i.e., Exit Order’s “Mass Panic”) blares from the device for several beats before SHE stops it with a tap of her finger on the screen.
HE
What was that?
SHE
A moment of “Mass Panic.”
HE
A…what?
SHE
“Mass Panic.” It’s a song. By a kind of neo-punk group. Out of Boston.
HE
Oddly fitting given the situation.
Beat.
SHE (quietly—for once)
I also dance.
HE (with awe)
The lady is a dancer.
SHE
Not formally trained or anything. Well, at least not since I was eight or nine.
HE
Ballet?
SHE
You overestimate my abilities, even as a much more limber and disciplined eight-year-old. No, hip hop. Which for anyone under 12 is really just a moderately expensive free-for-all play date.
HE
Go on then.
SHE
What?
HE
Show us some of those fresh moves you learned in hip hop class.
SHE
I knew I shouldn’t have told you…
HE
Kidding. I’m just kidding.
Beat.
HE
I really would like to see you dance.
SHE
I’m not a performer.
HE (an offering)
I’ll do it with you.
Beat.
SHE
I can choose the song?
HE
As long as it’s not another moment of “Mass Panic.”
Beat.
Then SHE swipes her phone screen several more times before Radiohead’s “Lotus Flower” plays. The falsetto is haunting and, for a moment, the pair just listens. Then, slowly, SHE begins to sway in time to the music and her swaying eventually becomes a series of erratic movements mirroring Thom York’s from the “Lotus Flower” video.
HE (laughing)
I remember this. Hashtag Thom Dance!
SHE (also laughing)
Hashtag Thom Dance.
HE jumps to his feet and begins making similar erratic movements with his body. They dance the Thom Dance. Unselfconsciously. Unapologetically. Maybe they sing snatches of the lyrics. Maybe not.
Then, abruptly, the music stops. Her phone charge has been depleted. HE and SHE face each other across the playing space. The ghost light between them. They likely are panting from their dancing. Several beats. Then…
HE
I’m scared.
Beat.
SHE
So am I.
HE extends his arm, palm forward, toward SHE. After a beat, SHE follows suit. They inch closer. One centimeter at a time. And then, just before their hands finally touch:
Blackout.
End of play.
